The World in Summary; New Evidence Of Chemicals

Published: March 14, 1982

A couple of weeks ago, Defense Secretary Caspar W. Weinberger accused the Soviet Union of using chemical weapons in Afghanistan and said there was ''very good evidence'' to back up the allegations. Pressed for the evidence, a Pentagon aide checked high and low, then conceded ''I've got nothing.''

But apparently somebody had something: A week later, the Administration has accused Soviet forces of killing more than 3,000 Afghans with poison gas and other chemical weapons. The State Department said the allegations were based on accounts from Afghan military defectors, including officers trained in chemical warfare by the Soviet Union.

Testifying before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, Deputy Secretary of State Walter J. Stoessel said chemical attacks by the Russians in 47 incidents accounted for 3,042 deaths between the summer of 1979 and 1981. He added that the department had no samples, no pictures or cannister bombs as evidence. ''Nobody can put on the table a projectile or bomb,'' but medical correlation of victims' symptoms and dates of Russian attacks checked out, he said. The reason for going public with such details wasn't clear. Congress recently approved the Administration's request for $705 million for chemical warfare items in fiscal 1983.